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Python Workshops for Beginners/Reflections: Difference between revisions
Python Workshops for Beginners/Reflections (view source)
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Session 2 also featured a review session prior to the morning lecture.
We had a total of 10 mentors volunteer per session, with a total group of 22 volunteers. Mentors received very positive comments and feedback, with almost half of survey respondents labeling them "Excellent"; only one respondent rated them "Fair", with the rest of responses falling under "Good" (18%) and "Very Good" (29%).
We had about 230 participants apply to attend the sessions. About 100 of those were immediately filtered out for eligibility: no math or engineering undergrads were permitted to attend the workshops, as their programs have significant required programming components (often 2-3 classes in far more depth than we covered). We selected on programming skill (to ensure that all attendees were complete beginners), enthusiasm, and overall application quality, and I capped the total at 50 participants given our budget.
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* [https://docs.google.com/forms/d/15SfIlAWJinmax2m1r98L36FzLKWQl4QsEB9N0KyhgYg/viewform Follow-up survey]
We used this feedback to both evaluate what worked well and what did not. The final follow-up survey was intended to evaluate how effective the workshops were; we received 32 responses out of our group of 50 participants. We learned that over 60% of participants said they felt less intimidated by programming after completing the workshops, 75% found the workshops "Enjoyable" or "Very Enjoyable", 85% said their interest levels in programming increased, and 90% rated the workshops overall positively. Only four respondents (13%) did not use their new programming skills in any capacity after the workshops.
=== Morning Lectures ===
The CDSW began each full day with 2h lectures with no breaks. This was a little too intense for the students, so I decided to reduce the length to 1.5h and break things up with short, self-directed exercises. These went over very well. Furthermore, I'm not as
In the Session 3 survey, 35% of
=== Projects ===
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In all cases, we gave students red sticky notes they could use to signal that they needed help (a tool borrowed from [http://software-carpentry.org/ SWC]).
Afternoon sessions received less positive feedback than the morning lectures: 35% of survey respondents rated them "Fair", 41% "Good", and the remaining 24% "Very Good".
== Session 0: Python Setup ==
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